Hawaii’s Mountains – Here’s a link to the live web cam on the summit of near 13,800 foot Mauna Kea on the Big Island of Hawaii. This web cam is available during the daylight hours here in the islands…and when there’s a big moon shining down during the night at times. Plus, during the nights you will be able to see stars, and the sunrise and sunset too… depending upon weather conditions.

Aloha Paragraphs

Spouting Horn, Kauai

Generally good weather, with just a few
showers here and there for the next
few days

Winds quite light for the next several days…from the south and southeast generally. Here’s the latestweather map, showing the Hawaiian Islands, and the rest of the North Pacific Ocean. Here’s a real-time wind profile of the central Pacific…centered on the Hawaiian Islands. ~~~ We find low pressure systems to the west and north of the islands…with a trailing cold front to our northwest. At the same time, we see high pressure systems offshore to the northeast of Hawaii…with a ridge extending west over the islands. We’ll find a period of southeast and south winds through mid-week, as a weak cold front moves by just to the north of the state. A trade wind flow will begin again Thursday into the weekend.Satellite imageryshows patchy low clouds over and around the state…along with some deeper clouds not far to the west through north of the islands. These clouds are associated with an area of low pressure, and have towering cumulus…or perhaps even a thunderstorm. Here’s thelooping radar image, showing just a few light showers coming into the state, although with a small, more concentrated area of showers edging in towards Kauai. Looking at this largersatellite image, which is in the looping mode, we can see an impressive area of deeper clouds to our north, with a second area further to the northwest.

This area of low pressure, with associated cold fronts…should remain north of our area into mid-week. We’re expecting fairly dry weather conditions to prevail through the next several days, although with a few showers locally…especially over the slopes during the afternoon hours. Later this week, this front, which will be to the north and northeast of the state then, may contribute its remnant clouds and showers to our windward sides…on the strengthening trade winds into the weekend. I’ll be back early Tuesday morning with your next new weather narrative from paradise, I hope you have a great Monday night wherever you’re spending it! Aloha for now…Glenn.

Here on Maui, at the 3,100 foot elevation, at my upper Kula, Maui weather tower, the air temperature was 56.7F degrees at 550am on this early Monday morning. It’s still too dark to see out, so when it gets light, I’ll let you know what I see in our local skies.

~~~ It’s now 720am, with an air temperature of 57 degrees. There nice blue skies above, with beautiful streaks of icy cirrus clouds…which lit up a gorgeous pink at sunrise! Looking down into the Central Valley, I can see that we have an intrusion of volcanic haze (vog), now hanging over us. This haze is being carried over us, having been carried our way on the light southeasterly breezes…from the vents on the Big Island. Otherwise, it’s a nice day, in which I’m quite sure we’ll see clouds forming over the slopes of the mountains later, with a few generally light showers falling then too.

~~~ We’re into the early afternoon hours now, at 1pm, with mostly cloudy skies…and thick volcanic hazy too. The air temperature is 73.2 degrees, and it doesn’t feel like showers are right around the corner. We may see clouds lower, and fog creep in later, with a few light showers with time…not quite sure yet.

~~~ The first order of business here on Maui at least, is to let you know how thick our volcanic haze is! It’s super thick, so dense in fact that I can’t see the West Maui Mountains…from here in Kula. It’s 70 degrees here at 515pm, with partly cloudy skies, and just strong enough of a light breeze, that my wind chimes are letting me know they’re hanging from the eave. It tried to work up to a little rain this afternoon, but never quite made it…other than perhaps 1-2 drops for a moment. Skies should clear for the most part soon, allowing cooler air from the mountains, to slide down towards the coasts early Tuesday. Tuesday will have very similar weather, to what we found Monday, for the most part. By the way, thanks to all you folks who are clicking on the Google Ads…its partially what keeps this website going! The ads are at the top and bottom of each page.

Interesting:With Climate Change, Greenland Is Bracing For Exploitation – The ill effects of climate change are becoming well known, and now here’s another: The melting ice cap in Greenland has the country now bracing for a gold rush.

As the ice melts at record pace in Greenland, the world’s miners, oil workers and construction teams are planning to descend on the country in the next few years, to start digging below the retreating icecap for its ores, hydrocarbons and minerals.

In addition, the dramatic melt of the Arctic sea ice may within one or two generations locate Greenland on a vastly profitable trans-polar trading route between the Pacific and Atlantic oceans.

Greenland is the world’s largest island, with a total area of around 2.2 million square kilometres. How is the country responding to these changes?

Prime Minister Aleqa Hammond Is Watching Carefully

It was at the end of March 2013 that 47-year-old Hammond became Greenland’s first female prime minister, ushering in the first change in parties in 30 years. Greenland is officially a part of Denmark, but has a great deal of autonomy in almost every area. The country is four times the size of France, but has a population of just 56,000.

At that time the new government of Greenland announced that it would not grant any fresh offshore oil and gas drilling licenses in the country’s Arctic waters and would also place existing licenses under greater scrutiny. The moratorium was a result of concerns raised by Greenpeace about the risk of oil spills and the fear that offshore oil and gas operations would increase climate change.

It seems that the Prime Minister has changed her mind.

Hammond is being courted by world leaders who see the Arctic as an emerging strategic zone.
Greenland Has Awarded Over 120 Licenses to Explore
Chinese, American, Russian, British, Japanese and Korean companies, among others, have all staked claims for its resources, and her government has awarded more than 120 licenses to explore for oil and gas, iron ore, uranium, emeralds and nickel as well as what are thought to be the largest deposits of rare earths vital for digital technologies outside China.

Greenlanders have traditionally lived in remote, scattered communities, largely supported by fishing and hunting, and Hammond is well aware that the arrival of tens of thousands of foreign workers will be as economically important and as culturally disruptive as anything in Greenland’s history.

“The shock will be profound. But we have faced colonisation, epidemics and modernisation before,” she says. “The decisions we are making [to open up the country to mining and oil exploitation] will have enormous impact on lifestyles, and our indigenous culture. But we have always come out on top.”
Should Greenland Be Encouraging the Gold Rush?
Not everyone thinks that handing out licenses is the right way to go.

Aqqaluk Lynge is chair of the Inuit Circumpolar Council which represents Inuits from Alaska, Greenland and Canada at the U.N. and other forums. He believes that if you want to become rich, it comes with a price.

“People have to imagine the consequences of what the influx of foreign labour will be. Being a minority in your own country, is that what you want? We have to be more realistic. We should be very careful inviting foreign mining companies. We have had experiences before when whole towns have been changed with the influx of Danish contractors. We lack experts in many areas like health. 56,000 people cannot [do] everything,” he says.